Advisory Board

INFOCORE’s External Expert Advisory Board comprises a variety of renowned academic experts, policy makers, and practitioners, who have agreed to lend their expertise to the INFOCORE consortium. The Advisory Board participates in the quality management process that ensures the highest scientific standards, prompt usability and relevance, and ethical compliance of all findings and outputs generated by the project.

Scott Althaus is Professor of Political Science and Communication, and Associate Director of the Cline Center for Democracy, at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, USA. His research interests in political communication, public opinion, and political psychology explore the role of political accountability in democratic governance, as well as communication between governments and citizens during times of conflict. He is currently finishing a book for Cambridge University Press on the dynamics of popular support for America’s wars, and is preparing a second book on the ways that strategic communication practices by military and governmental leaders shape the journalistic construction of news about military conflicts.

Cathleen Kantner is Professor for International Relations and European Studies at the Institute for Social Sciences of the University of Stuttgart. Her current research focuses on transnational political communication and transnational public spheres. Debates about European security and defence issues, emerging collective identities, and shared normative beliefs are of central interest for her. Cathleen Kantner combines strong interest in constructivist theories of International Relations, political theory and corpus-linguistic content analytical methods. She is the author of No modern Babel. The Communicative Preconditions of a European Public Sphere (in German language, VS Sozialwissenschaften, 2004) and War and Intervention in the Transnational Public Sphere. Problem-Solving and European Identity-Formation. (Routledge/UACES Contemporary European Studies, 2015).

Nel Ruigrok (1972) received her PhD in 2005 for her dissertation called Journalism of Attachment; Dutch Newspapers during the Bosnian War. From 2005 until 2008 she was assistant professor at the Department of Communication at the University of Amsterdam. From 2008 Nel Ruigrok is an independent researcher in the field of media analysis. Together with Wouter van Atteveldt she founded her own media research company “La Jupe Sauvage”(LJS Media Research). LJS Media Research conducts media analyses for a number of (commercial) organizations. Nel (together with Wouter van Atteveldt) also offers lectures and courses at national and international universities. Research interests concern political communication in general and especially the role of media during election campaigns, and the role of the media during conflicts.

Philip Seib is Professor of Journalism and Public Diplomacy and Professor of International Relations at the University of Southern California. His work principally addresses public diplomacy, the role of new media in foreign affairs, and conflict-related issues. His most recent book is Real-Time Diplomacy: Politics and Power in the Social Media Era.

David A. Snow is a Distinguished Professor of Sociology at the University of California, Irvine. His research interests include collective behavior and social movements; ethnographic and qualitative field methods; social psychology from a symbolic interactionist perspective, with an emphasis on framing processes, conversion, and identity work; and socioeconomic marginality in urban contexts with an emphasis on homelessness and poverty. He has (co-)authored well over a hundred articles and chapters as well as nine books, including the Wiley-Blackwell Encyclopedia of Social and Political Movements (with D. della Porta, B. Klandermans, and D. McAdam). Professor Snow is past President of the Society for the Study of Symbolic Interaction and the Pacific Sociological Association, and a recent Vice President of the American Sociological Association.

Ejeviome Eloho Otobo is a GGI Senior Expert both in the Peace and Security Section as well as in the Economic Policy Section. Until recently, he served as the Director and Deputy Head of the Peacebuilding Support Office (PBSO) at the United Nations Headquarters in New York, leading the Office’s efforts in supporting the Peacebuilding Commission (PBC). He has worked in various high-level positions at international and African institutions after a distinguished career at the Policy Planning Staff of the Nigerian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He served as Deputy Director for Policy Analysis and Monitoring in the Office of the Special Adviser on Africa (OSAA) at the United Nations in New York. He has published extensively on peacebuilding, public service reforms, institutional development, governance, and a variety of other issues.

Jamie Shea is NATO Deputy Assistant Secretary General for Emerging Security Challenges. He has been working with NATO since 1980 in numerous positions, including Director of Policy Planning in the Private Office of the Secretary General, Deputy Assistant Secretary General for External Relations, Public Diplomacy Division, Director of Information and Press, Spokesman of NATO and Deputy Director of Information and Press. Jamie Shea is a professor at the Collège d’Europe, Bruges, Visiting Lecturer in the Practice of Diplomacy at the University of Sussex, Associate Professor of International Relations at the American University, Washington DC, and is involved with several more prominent academic institutions, think tanks, and associations. He also is a regular speaker on NATO and European security affairs and public diplomacy.

Richard Atwood joined Crisis Group in 2009. As research director, he oversees Crisis Group’s thematic research and best practices. He also works with the president, chief policy officer and program staff on policy development. He has expertise in democratic transitions, political institutions, peace processes and operations and early warning and is especially involved in Crisis Group’s work on elections. Prior to Crisis Group, he worked in elections and peace operations with the UN, the International Foundation for Election Systems, and other organisations in a large variety of countries. He has designed and given trainings to parliamentarians, election commissions, UN and EU staff on elections, electoral systems and election-related violence in conflict-affected societies.

Sonya Reines-Djivanides is a peacebuilding professional with over ten years of experience in international conflict resolution. She is currently the Executive Director of the European Peacebuilding Liaison Office (EPLO), the independent civil society platform of European NGOs, networks of NGOs and think tanks which are committed to peacebuilding and the prevention of violent conflict. She previously served as the Chair of EPLO’s Steering Committee.
From 2004-2015, Sonya worked for Search for Common Ground where she managed and oversaw SFCG’s Brussels Headquarters, European fundraising, liaison, advocacy and program support. She has managed the development and implementation of SFCG’s Track II programs, and organized, facilitated and participated in high-level meetings and social society exchanges in the US, Iran, Syria and Europe. Sonya holds an MA in International Relations with focus on International Conflict Negotiation and an advanced Certificate in International Conflict Management from the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University. She has received additional training in post conflict reconstruction and humanitarian situations, international mediation and conflict analysis.

Arne König has been a Journalist since the mid 70-ties, mainly in print, but also in radio and TV. His main subjects are media and human rights. For many years, he has been a full time unionist as vice president in the Swedish Union of Journalists, and as President of the European Federation of Journalists, 2004-20013. Now he works as freelance journalist on topics as freedom of the media/freedom of expression and democracy.

Giacomo Mazzone is Head of Institutional Relations at the European Broadcasting Union and of Members Relations South since January 2011. He is in charge of follow-up with members of the MENA region and of the Northern shore of Mediterranean Sea. He has been head of the project of assistance to the Tunisian National Broadcaster in 2011 and head of the special assistance projects for the other countries in the region. He is also in charge of the relations with the United Nations system and the Council of Europe. He is a World Broadcasting Union representative to ICANN and to the Advisory Group on the Internet Governance to the UN Secretary General. He has 30 years’ experience as manager in the information and international relations sectors, and has worked as a journalist for various, traditional and new, national and international media.

Patrick H. Leusch is currently Managing Director of the Deutsche Welle Global Media Forum and CEO of the DW owned Media Services GmbH. He is responsible for the thematic concept and the organization of this leading global media conference, and in charge of international partner relations and fundraising for the conference. Patrick is Secretary General and Member of the Steering Committee of the Global Forum for Media Development, GFMD, the global network of media development organizations.
Before joining the Director Generals Office at DW, he was for four years Head International Cooperation of DW Akademie, a world leading media development organization. He has worked for many years as an independent TV and Radio reporter, producer of features and documentaries, senior editor for leading German broadcasters and correspondent for Western Africa. He has also founded mediatrainer.de, a network of senior experts in media development and institutional capacity building, and holds a Master in Psycho-Pedagogy.

Iris Abraham is a political analyst, conflict resolution practitioner and media & communications advisor. She has worked over a decade in international affairs, peacekeeping, conflict resolution with the European Union, the United Nations and academic institutions. She is currently the Head of International Relations and Strategic Partnerships at euronews, managing relationships with news channels, universities, international organizations and government institutions around the globe. She has served with UN Peacekeeping in Haiti, and worked in Europe, North Africa, the Middle East, Latin/South America, the Caribbean, and Southeast Asia. Her experience encompasses political and conflict analysis, policy advice, electoral and good governance assistance, dialogue and reconciliation, communication and external relations.

This project has received funding from the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme for Research,Technological Development and Demonstration under Grant Agreement No. 613308, 1.1.2014 - 31.12.2016